The RCN has collected evidence, based on a variety of official sources, that 61,113 NHS posts across the UK have disappeared or been earmarked to be lost since it began monitoring workforce numbers a month before the May 2010 election.

But Lansley insisted that although the number of nurses had fallen by almost 3,000 since the coalition took power, overall numbers of clinical staff were up by almost 4,000, because of greater recruitment of doctors.

I worry that people imagine fuzzily that the Lansley reforms are going to usher in a golden age. One where clinicians, IT people and administrators are going to set aside their differences and work together happily ever after to collate vast stacks of error-free data and produce revealing statistics, which lead to the cure of all known diseases.

I don't get it. They haven't done so in the past, as some of the speakers admitted in their speeches, for instance, 70% of record access projects fail to get support of the clinicians.

Over the weekend, The Telegraph reported that a recent poll of nurses and healthcare assistants found half of those working in casualty departments saw treatment being given outside of medical areas every day, because units were too full.

BBC News is also reporting that policies such as free prescriptions 'need value testing,' according to business expert Professor Brian Morgan.

The BMA has just issued a press release on its ballot over industrial action. Ballot packs are being posted out to 103,000 doctors across the UK today, as medics consider taking action for the first time since 1975.

Dr Hamish Meldrum, the BMA's chairman of council, said:

This is not where we set out to be – industrial action is only ever a last resort. However, the Government's refusal to rethink its unnecessary reforms to a pension scheme that is already affordable and sustainable has left us with no alternative. We are not talking about a full withdrawal of labour. All emergency and urgent care would be provided, and doctors would still be at their usual places of work.

The RCN Congress is now underway in Harrogate. It's running until 17th May and I'm sure we will see plenty of coverage in the news over the next few days, especially with both Andrew Lansley and Dr Peter Carter speaking today.

If you're there, please keep us updated - we'll be following all week on twitter #RCNcongress

Good morning and welcome to the daily blog from the Guardian's healthcare network. We'll be rounding up the top news stories throughout the day, as well as bringing you our pick of healthcare-related comment pieces, blogposts and tweets.We'd love to hear from you too, if there's something you've spotted online today, please add a comment under the line or tweet us: @GdnHealthcare